The current Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has put stress on healthcare providers all over the world. In addition, patients are crowding (and often overcrowding) healthcare facilities and especially Emergency Departments (ED) located in those facilities.
In an effort to reduce the number of patients being transported to emergency departments that could receive appropriate care at an alternate (non-emergency department) medical facility, the Virginia Office of Emergency Medical Services (OEMS) is providing guidance in the form of a white paper to both EMS agencies and facilities considered to be allowable destinations for ambulance transports under the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services guidance.
Find more information at this link: http://www.vdh.virginia.gov/emergency-medical-services/2020/04/14/ems-transportation-of-patients-to-alternate-sites-white-paper/.